CLASS NOTES

1960

In April of 2017, Tim Timmons and Butch Hilsabeck met for lunch at the famous Bluebonnet Café in Marble Falls, Texas with their wives Nancy and Suzanne. Jon “Butch” Hilsabeck and Hershel “Tim” Timmons attended TAS in 1957 and 1958 (Class of 1960). Brian Hanson of Austin, Texas missed the get-together as he was attending an Explorer’s Club meeting. Butch, Tim, and Brian have stayed in touch and kept up their friendships for over 60 years.

1964

Marilu de Gonzales Posada (Marilu de Cossio at TAS 1961-1963) visited Taiwan in March upon the invitation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She recalls her TAS experience fondly during the two years when her father established the Embassy of Peru in Taiwan. As she browsed through the yearbook pages, she shared memories of teachers, singing in talent shows, and playing volleyball and tennis. She is the President of Instituto Mundo Libre in Peru, an organization dedicated to the prevention, rehabilitation, and the integral development of children at high risk. The organization has won recognition by the United Nations and several countries around the world.

1968

Steven Chiu, Lily Chang, Vincente Tang, and Maria Chen enjoyed a meal in Tianmu. Uthai LimLawan returned to Taipei after almost 50 years of living in his hometown in Thailand.

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1969 Madeline Ma had an opportunity to see her TAS friends who are all from the same Class: Nora King, Rosita Yang, and Mary Chua.

CLASS NOTES Jessica Phelps West (at TAS 19691971): I recently joined the faculty at the Florida State University School of Theatre as the head of the graduate program in directing. Prior to that, I taught at universities in Georgia and North Carolina and have had a long and illustrious career in professional theatre as well. My love for theatre began at TAS under the tutelage of Ms. Jackson. I was also in Flower Drum Song and a few other shows. Ms. Jackson kept us busy onstage and backstage learning all the facets of theatre. I will never forget those early beginnings and how immersive her program was for all the students. It was indeed special. Go Tigers!

1970

Lena Mao Hsu: I would like to inspire fellow alumni with my example of healthy living and sensible eating habits. After TAS, I graduated from Woodbury University and married a physician. I have two children and two grandsons. In 2011, I became an avid gardener. After arthroscopic surgery on my knee in 2015, I produced a YouTube video to help others with similar challenges to recover faster. I also started swimming 45 minutes each day as therapy. Check out my YouTube channel (lenacdoll).

1972

April Ahuna Goetz visited Taiwan and spent time with Betty Sun. April recently relocated back to Washington State after a long career teaching in Germany.

1973

Tom Hope got together with Scott Taylor ’75 after 40 years!

1975

Anita Wong shared a photo on Facebook of a Thanksgiving Dinner celebration in San Francisco with alumni from the 70’s: Marta Hsu ’73, Nina Liang ’73, Rita Liang ’73, Anita Wong ’75, and David Ling ’74.

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1988

Once again, Jammie Liang hosted a group of her TAS friends in her home in San Francisco.

1989

Royce Hong’s company, Xing Mobility, will release its supercar prototype, dubbed “Miss R,” with their in-house developed modular battery system, the key for the car’s performance. Xing’s new battery technology is being deployed globally in city buses, ridesharing scooters, and construction vehicles.

1991

Several alumni living in Shanghai gathered for a mini-reunion. 1993

Alumni celebrated the end of the year with a casual gathering in Taipei. 1994

Janet Chen was named one of seven YWCA Columbus 2018 Women of Achievement Winners.

Kyle Webster sold KyleBrush.com to Adobe, adding over 1,000 digital brushes to Adobe’s Creative Cloud tools. Kyle has created the world’s best-selling Photoshop brushes for professional illustrators, animators, and designers. Follow him at KyleTwebster.com.

Neelam Parmar published a book titled Digital Parenting available in print and also on the Kindle. Neelam has a wealth of experience in digital learning strategies for schools across the primary and senior age range. She is currently Director of E-Learning at Ashford School, United Learning and has recently completed her PhD.

Wayne Chan successfully finished the 2017 Eco-x Grindstone 100 Race. He wasn’t even walking with a limp the next day! 1996

David Huang released a new Virtual Reality (VR) game that was nominated for the HTC 2018 Viveport Developer Award. “Battle Sky VR” is a multiplayer game that allows a player to explore the world freely by flying spontaneously. Flora Kao, Amy Yeh ’95, and Caroline Ma ’97 got together at Flora’s art exhibit in Los Angeles in October.

1997

Jay Cheng spoke at FutureWard Central, founded by Jonathan Liao ’00, about WeMo Scooter, the new scooter-sharing start-up in Taipei jointly established by five alumni. 1998

Freya Lim performed in a popular original musical in Taipei at the Sun YatSen Memorial Hall in January. 1999

Cecilia Tsai has called Switzerland her home for the past 11 years. She left the private banking industry when she became a mom in 2013 and started her own baby carrier company with her husband. In 2 years, they raised more than US$250,000 from Kickstarter. They are very proud of their MiaMily HIPSTER PLUS 3D baby carrier which has won the Bizzie Baby 2014 Gold Award, Mom’s Choice Gold Award 2016, and Academy Star Cribsie Award for New Product Arrival in 2016. When she is not managing her company, she is busy being a mom of 3 kids under 5 years old. She enjoyed a dim sum lunch in Hong Kong in July 2016 with Ying Chen and Cindy Ho.

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Jonathan Liao and Bruce Bateman ’77 founded FutureWard, one of the biggest co-working and maker spaces in Taipei. The venue offers scalable private and open-plan offices, dedicated event spaces, and business services. One of the branches even offers access to well-equipped 3D printers, machines for prototyping, metalworking, and woodworking, and ceramic tools. 2001

Shelley Lin released her popular portable baby monitor branded Totokan. It livestreams to any smart device and even measures breathing and heartbeat. 2003

Chuck Ma and Geo Lee have known each other since seventh grade at TAS. Check out their Facebook page named “Seventhgrade” to view entertaining videos.

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2007

Hide Kurokawa opened a new restaurant in Tienmu. Opaka is a farmto-table new American tapas-style restaurant focusing on flavors from around the world. With a restaurant and bar, customers enjoy a family-style tasting menu, Omakase menu, or smallbite “munchables.”

2008

Eric Tsai, Lillian Lin, and Michael Chua got together last summer. It’s almost time for the 10-year reunion!

2009

Julia Wang is currently an MD/ PHD medical scientist and a McNair Student Scholar in the Bellen Lab at Baylor College of Medicine. Last year, she wrote a breakthrough article on bioinformatics published in the American Journal of Human Genetics. She was also featured in an article by Baylor College of Medicine and on various news channels, and recognized by the National Institute of Health (NIH).

2011

Phillip Ball returned to TAS after leaving in 2004. He was delighted to spend time with his Grade 5 teacher Mr. Rick Rabon, currently an Associate Principal in the Lower School.

Max Cheng published an article in the British Journal of Cardiac Nursing’s December issue titled “Classical Music in Cardiac Prevention and Rehabilitation.” He concluded that classical music significantly increased an individual’s peak heart rate during a cardiac exercise session, thereby, increasing physical activity intensity.

2012

Lin King was featured in the Emerging Voices section of Slice Magazine at the Brooklyn Book Fair.

2013

Caitlin Magee, former TAS Jazz Ensemble member, won Best Singer, Best Performance, and Most Popular

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2014

Sunny Sheu graduated from the Juilliard School in May and signed a contract to perform at Taipei’s National Recital Hall in May of 2019.

2017

April Chu led the Wellesley Track and Field team with her 1000m win at MIT’s Gordon Kelly Invitational in February!

Former Faculty

Dr. Louise Tolbert: We gathered on April 26, 2017 at the home of Kathy Keenan in Poinciana outside of Orlando, Florida, where Cherry (Hart) Brown also lives. Carol Chadwick came from Oregon, Glenn Wolfe from Wisconsin, Mary Yamazaki from Panama, and Fran Larson and I from other parts of Florida. We celebrated Ralph Whalen’s retirement. TAS had a special influence on teachers that made us so close and so eager to stay in touch. TAS also had the most professional faculty with whom I worked • in my entire career and a great student population. The non-teaching staff was terrific, too. We had relationships with the support staff who made our lives so much easier. It was a unique privilege to work at such a special school.

A group of former teachers gets together twice a year in Oregon. L to R: Carol Chadwick, Kay Haberlach, Henry Schwarz, Charlene Schneiter, Roger Cox, Sue Cox, Susan Rinker, Fred Schneiter, Jan Clark, Bill Funk They celebrated Chinese New Year for the ninth year at the Jin Wah Restaurant. Thanks to Jan Clark for organizing the special gatherings!

Peter Dratz (Activity Director at the Shilin campus) returned to TAS in April of 2017 leading a delegation of MUN students from Hong Kong. He spent time with former faculty member John Dankowski and current TAS Food Services Director Shawn O’Neal.